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UNITED 'STATES PATENT JOHN RUGGLES, OF THOMASTON, MAINE.

RAIL non RAILWAYVS.

specification of Letters raient No. '202, dated May 23, 1837.'-

T 0 all whom t may concern M Be it known that I JOHN RGGLES, of Thomaston, county of Lincoln, State of Maine, have invented a new and improved rail for railways, calculated greatly to diminish the expense of railways, increase the adhesion of the driving-wheels of the locomotive-engine, while it combines firmness and durability.

The following is a just description thereof-that is to say, string pieces are laid on cross ties or sleepers in the manner usual for supporting a flat iron rail. The string pieces may be 8 inches in width by 9 or 10 inches in depth. Along the upper side of the string pieces, a transverse section of which is seen at A in the annexed drawing, is a groove 3 inches Vwide being 3%); inches from the outside and 1?,- inches from the inside, for the insertion of a block rail B, Figure l; The string piece is beveled as at c and d, that water may not stand upon it; and the rail which is 8 inches wide by 4 inches in depth, extends an inch above the string piece on the outside, while the inside of the string piece is reduced two inches below the top of the r-ail to make room for the flanges of the wheels. The block rail is made of hard wood plank by sawing the plank transversely to the grain of the wood into blocks t inches in length measuring with the grain, which being inserted into the groove side by side, form a continuous rail with the grain of the wood perpendicular. rlhe ends of the blocks where they unite in the rail, should present, one of them, a convex obtuse angle, and the other a concave to correspond with it from top to bottom, to .unite them more firmly as shown at m, w, w, Fig. 2. The blocks should be doweled with inch dowels and pressed firmly together by wedging or otherwise. If thestring piece be of soft wood there should be laid at the bottom of the groove a base of hard wood board an inch in thickness to prevent the rail from settling into being intended as a defense to the rail against the flange of the wheels, it may not be required except on the outside rail at curvatures. Or they may be thicker at curvatures and thinner in other places; The'` plate should be about one inch wide and one-sixth of an inch thick, varying according to situations. It is seen at e.

The groove should be sprayed with a heated mixture of tar and p-itch and the seams at the insertion of the rail filled to exclude water and prevent decay. The string pieces and the rail should be paintedafter being adhesion of the wheelsso desirable on an` undulating road, and'will last a great number of years. the grooving of the string pieces'may be vkThe :top of The sawing of the Vrails and performed by machinery expeditiously;

and the adoption of blockrails .fixedVv as above described will lessen the expense of railways so as to admit of their construction in many-locationsl which will not justify the expense of iron rails. They will be found in most cases more economical than iron rails, as well in their first construction as in their use and maintenance for any given series of years.

Vhat I claim as my invention isl. The block-rail so formed as that the tread of the wheel shall be upon the end of the grain ofthe wood of which it is made,`instead of on the side of the grain; and the doweling and confining the rail and the top coating given to it as above described.

2. I claim also the defending the rail by a plate of iron and the inserting a hardwood base for the rail torest upon when the string pieces are soft wood.

I do not confine myself in the construci JOHN RUGGLES.

Witnesses:

JOHN T. GLEAsoN, LUGIN H. CHANDLER. 

